Valen took a deep breath.
“That was me—I broke her heart,” he said shortly. “It is…difficult for me to speak of such things, but while she was here, Selena and I formed a…connection.”
“We thought as much, Brother,” Tolern murmured. “If you were acting as her Master, it seemed difficult to believe you would do so without some kind of romantic attachment between the two of you.”
“We were very attached,” Valen admitted. “She is the most beautiful, perfect, special female I have ever met in my life. But I felt I could not…” He cleared his throat. “Could not continue the attachment. That’s why I saw her to the spaceport after the gala and then left, before watching to be certain she got on the shuttle safely. Whatever has happened to her is all my fault,” he added in a low voice.
“I don’t see how that could be true!” Tolern objected. He gestured at the viewscreen. “Just look—she’s right by a group of warriors and none of them would allow a female to be taken! She looks safe enough to me.”
“But she wasn’t safe,” Valen pointed out. “I should have stayed—I should have waited. But it was just too…” He cleared his throat again. “Too painful to watch her walk away.”
“Is there any way to speed this up?” Jessica asked anxiously. “How long did she stand there before they started boarding? Oh look—they’re boarding now,” she added, as the Kindred and their brides began entering the connecting tunnel which led to the shuttle.
“Watch Selena—why isn’t she boarding as well?” Tolern looked at the viewscreen in concern. “She seems distracted—she’s not even paying attention to what’s going on around her!”
“I should have warned her to be more alert in the spaceport,” Jessica said, her voice tight with anxiety. “Oh, Selena, be careful!” she exclaimed, as though the image of her friend could hear her.
Then, just as the last Kindred warrior and his bride entered the connecting tunnel, two Ma’shorkan males in gold and black livery came into the camera’s view and headed right for her.
“Look—palace guards!” Valen exclaimed. “You can tell by the livery!”
Tolern shook his head. “I thought she’d been taken by slavers!”
“I did as well. But why are the guards bothering her?” Valen asked. “Damn it—I wish we had sound!”
On the viewscreen, the two guards seemed to be arguing with Selena about something. They were trying to pull her violin case away from her, but she was resisting, Valen saw. Then, finally, she thrust the case at one of them, who opened it and turned around, hiding it from her view.
“Rotate the scene!” Tolern exclaimed. “We have to see what they’re doing!”
“Agreed.” Valen picked up the viewscreen remote and pushed some buttons. The 3-D image on the viewscreen began to turn so that they were watching from another angle.
“Rewind it!” Jessica exclaimed. “What is he doing to her violin?”
They rewound the images and slowed it down. After a moment, it became apparent that one of the guards was slipping something small that glittered into the body of the violin. But no matter how much Valen magnified the image or how many angles they looked at it from, none of them could see exactly what the object was.
“Oh, never mind what it is!” Jessica exclaimed at last. “Go on, go on—we have to know what happened next!”
“True.” Valen started the footage again and they watched as the first guard grabbed the violin by the neck and shook it in Selena’s face.
“Look at how he’s holding it—that’s all wrong!” Jessica exclaimed. “Selena is always so careful with her instrument.”
“What is the other one doing?” Tolern asked, frowning. “It looks like he’s making a holo-call.”
Indeed, the second guard was doing something to his personal communications device. In a moment, a large, blurred image appeared over the device in his palm.
“He made a holo-call—but to who?” Tolern exclaimed, squinting at the screen.
“Can we enhance the image or sharpen it somehow?” Jessica asked eagerly.
Valen shook his head regretfully.
“I’m afraid not—we run into this issue in Court all the time, when submitting holo-cam evidence. You can’t take a good holographic image of another hologram. The pixels and light particles making up the holo blur and fuzz together, making the picture indecipherable.”
“But…then how do we know who they were talking to?” Jessica asked anxiously.”
“We don’t,” Valen said grimly. “But I think we can make an educated guess.”
“Well, it’s probably someone at the palace,” Tolern said thoughtfully. He looked at Valen. “You seem to have a good idea of who it is, Brother.”
Valen nodded.
“I do. If I had to guess, I’d wager good money that the person the two guards are talking to is Empress the Third herself.”
“Really? Why?” Jessica exclaimed.
Rapidly, Valen filled them in on the interactions between Selena and the third Empress and how the vengeful Ma’shorkan female had tried again and again to get Selena into trouble.